Page 65 of The Identicals
At the same time, Ainsley hears her name. Teddy is galloping down the stairs toward her. Beneath the white polo shirt of his uniform, Ainsley sees the leather strap and, dangling from it, the cross. She knows now that Teddy has been raised Pentecostal. She had always meant to google what that meant, but she never has. Candace probably knows. Maybe it’s similar to being Catholic.
“Hey,” Ainsley says.
“Hey,” Teddy says. He is tan under his freckles, and his hair is a shade lighter, golden glints in the red. He’s been in the sun, at the beach, probably with Candace and Emma and BC and Anna and all Ainsley’s former friends. The tan makes him look healthy and strong; it’s a blessing summer has bestowed upon him. At least Ainsley got to the beach on Sunday with Harper and Ramsay. Maybe she looks like she’s glowing, too, although she kind of doubts it. Most of her summer so far has been spent under the fluorescent lights of the boutique or in her bedroom, doing her summer reading. She is going back to school in the fall as one of the truly pathetic kids who actually found time to get it finished before Labor Day weekend.
“I was looking for the ladies’ room,” she says.
“Who is that woman you’re here with?” Teddy asks.
“My friend,” Ainsley says. “Caylee.”
“Never seen her before,” Teddy says. “Is she incollege?”
“Out of college,” Ainsley says. “She used to bartend at the Straight Wharf. Your uncle probably knows her.”
“Probably,” Teddy says. “So is she, like, your nanny or babysitter, then?”
“No,” Ainsley says with a patient smile. “She’s just a friend. How is your summer going?”
He shrugs. “Fine, I guess.”
“How’s Candace?” Ainsley asks. She doesn’t mean to ask this; she doesn’t want to know. Yes, she does, but she doesn’t want him to know that she wants to know. “I heard you took her for dinner at Ventuno.”
Teddy’s forehead creases the way it used to when he didn’t understand the math homework. “I didn’t take Candace to Ventuno,” he says. “Emma did.”
“What?” Ainsley says.
“I don’t have the money to take Candace to Ventuno.”
“But you have a job.”
“I sign my checks over to Graham. He’s saving them for my college tuition. But Dutch gives Emma however much money she wants. She took Candace to Ventuno, and they both got really drunk, I guess, then Candace threw up in the street outside the Juice Bar, and I guess Mr. Duncombe was in line with his kids, and he called Candace’s parents to come pick her up.”
“Oh,” Ainsley says. She is vibrating with suppressed glee. Emma, not Teddy, took Candace. The announcement in the boutique was a bluff. The detail about the flower in Candace’s hair had been fabricated. And Candace—an altar girl at Saint Mary’s—had gotten sick in front of the Juice Bar, and Mr. Duncombe saw her! The only downside to this story is that Ainsley hasn’t heard it from anyone else. She is really and truly a social pariah if no one thought to share this news with her. Ainsley warns herself against being too judgmental. If she had stayed on her self-destructive course, she could easily have been the girl puking on the street. But it wasn’t her this time.
“You and Candace are still a couple, though, right?” Ainsley says.
Teddy scuffs the toe of his plastic-looking Top-Sider against the wooden floor. “Honestly, I’m not sure. She hangs out with Emma all the time now. They go to the beach together every day. Neither of them has to work. They go to parties with all the summer kids.”
“That’s what I did last summer with Emma,” Ainsley says.
“Yeah,” Teddy says. “It’s like Candace is you now. The new you.”
“If Candace is the new me, then who am I?”
Teddy gives her the slow cowboy smile. Ainsley basks in the warmth of his gaze—he’s looking at her the way he used to—and she nearly falls into that golden pond. But no. She will not be such a pushover.
“Ladies’ room?” she asks.
Teddy snaps back to his senses. “Behind you,” he says.
“Thanks,” Ainsley says. “See you around.”
When Ainsley returns to the table, Caylee says, “I was about to send a search party.”
Ainsley spears a juicy chunk of pineapple. She thinks she handled Teddy pretty well, considering. She didn’t tear up or beg him to take her back. She wasn’t snotty or disdainful or sarcastic, even when he asked her the offensive question about Caylee being her babysitter. She had been pleasant, calm, even-tempered. If Candace is the new Ainsley, then maybe Ainsley is now the old Ainsley, the person she had been before meeting Emma.
Ainsley’s phone pings.
